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United States, North Carolina, Carrboro, English, Paul, Male, 56-60, All Music, All Food.

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Wednesday, June 25, 2003

A Google Fugue   It all began, as it often does, at Slate with another Bushism Of The Day from Jacob Weisberg:   “I urge the leaders in Europe and around the world to take swift, decisive action against terror groups such as Hamas, to cut off their funding, and to support—cut funding and support, as the United States has done."—Washington, D.C., June 25, 2003 Then, back to Slate's home page, and a quick scroll down to a Breakfast Table conversation between Walter Dellinger and Dahlia Lithwick, about the recent Supremes’ edict about affirmative action, where Walter’s entry ended with this folksy bit: That's it. I'm off to breakfast at Sutton's Drugstore in Chapel Hill. I want to find out what the folks at the counter think should happen tomorrow when the court decides the Texas homosexual sodomy case. I'll let you know. Sutton’s, I’ve been there. Nice place, old-fashioned drugstore with a lunch counter, not that different than the Walgreens in Greensboro in 1960: Sit-in campaigns: In February, black college student Joseph McNeill was refused service at the lunch counter at a Greensboro, N.C. Woolworth's retail store. McNeill returned the next day with three friends. They were not served. They returned the next day and again were not served. After an article in the New York Times, more students - black and white - joined the protest that spread nationwide. And then Dahlia, always ready with a snappy comeback, says: And let me know what the boys at Sutton's drugstore are saying about the sodomy case. Ah, what a wicked tongue! – but I was focused on Sutton’s by that time so I Googled a bit of history and found this page about the Old Chapel Hill Cemetery. There are the remains of James L. Sutton (1891-1950), who founded Sutton’s drugstore, of Charles Kuralt (1934-1897), of CBS Sunday Morning fame, and Rachael Crook (1879-1951) (murdered): Ran Chapel Hill's first launderette; also ran fish/produce market which later became Crook's Corner Restaurant. Crook's Corner? I came here in 1989 and that meant shrimp and grits! Bill Neal! Southern Cooking noveau! Wait - murdered? That's terrible! But let's learn something about Bill before we move along... About the author The late Bill Neal founded the restaurants La Residence and Crook's Corner, both landmarks in Chapel Hill. He was author of Biscuits, Spoonbread, & Sweet Potato Pie; coauthor of Good Old Grits Cookbook: Have Grits Your Way; and editor of Through the Garden Gate, a collection of gardening essays by the late Elizabeth Lawrence. How many friends and I have eaten at Crook’s Corner, out on the patio, surrounded by bamboo? Nearly everybody who has ever visited me in Chapel Hill, that's how many! And there’s a Murder in its past! How exciting! So how did Rachel get murdered? Turns out it is one of the great mysteries of Chapel Hill. Rachel Crook was found beaten to death on a deserted road about 4 miles from campus on Aug. 30, 1951. …Crook dubbed her converted chicken house between Chapel Hill and Carrboro "Crook's Corner" long before the name was associated with a Chapel Hill eatery. No one saw the 71-year-old disappear from her shop. The trial of Hobart M. Lee, a construction worker from Burlington, failed to bring about a conviction for Crook's murder. The tire marks at the scene of the crime matched the tires on his 1949 green Ford truck. A heel print near Crook's body matched his shoes. Witnesses heard screams coming from a green truck as it flew down N.C. 86 toward Hillsborough. But the jury, one that excluded any members from Chapel Hill, found him not guilty of Crook's death, and Lee went free. And there you have it, a Google jog down Franklin Street from Sutton’s to Crook’s, probably less than a mile...unless you take a detour through the graveyard. 7:54:29 PM    comment []

Hog Heaven   As an unrepentant carnivore, I’m in a weak position to criticize factory farms, but I have to admit I’m disgusted by cheap meat at any cost. The hog farms in North Carolina, covered in a repeat 60 Minutes feature last Sunday (and in a Pulitzer winning N&O series in 1995), are nevertheless disgusting.   The art of Public Relations is said to have begun with the work of a man named Ivy Lee, who rescued the reputation of John D. Rockefeller after the Ludlow Massacre by making up lies and printing them (the very crime cited in the recent high-tech lynching of Jayson Blair). Eventually, like all liars, Mr. Lee crossed the line and accepted a job with the German Dye Trust to promote a deeper understanding between the United States and Germany in the 1930s. The moral here, I guess, is that if you lie down with pigs, you’ll end up rolling in shit. The man who rescued Rockefeller from the reputation of a murderer died with the reputation of a Nazi sympathizer.   There is a gentler force at work in the recent activities at Mickey D’s. Last week, I read they were pressuring the meat industry to stop using antibiotics in not-quite-dead meat products. Now the NYT says (in an article Animal Welfare’s Unexpected Allies) that McDonald’s, Burger King, and Wendy’s are hiring animal welfare specialists to help their meat suppliers find ways to make their products short lives happier ones. This is not the same as PR. This is using a big leather wallet to make real improvements. It doesn’t make me completely lose my cynicism, the story gets page 1 NYT coverage before the changes are made, but it appears changes will be made.   One change is fascinating. The experts have suggested giving pigs 2 or 3 toys to play with as they while away the days awaiting slaughter. Whose image would you like to see on a pig’s doll?   This is the third animal rights story that caught my attention this week. I am no animal rights activist. In fact, I have password protected my computer to make sure the cats don’t join PETA while I’m out of the room. My concerns are those of any conscious carnivore. I want to eat meat, but I hate to see the animals tortured. This concern goes as far back as ancient Halal and Kosher traditions; it is mainstream, not radical. If PETA did not exist, those favoring factory farms (which have nothing to do with family farms, no matter how much advocates try to blur the line) would have to fund it. Maybe they already do. The best way to silence opposition is to create a bogeyman, a golem, whatever, something so weird that all rational concerns can be marginalized by putting them in the same pigpen. PETA unquestionably serves that function for the meat industry. 5:59:09 AM    comment []